Awaken the Power of a Healing Mindset - How I Overcame a Debilitating Disease

I was in a really serious health crisis and so I went in one more time got a stem cell injection however after the injection something just didn't feel right and then over time it got to the point where I could barely get up in the morning and then I couldn't walk I lost 40 pounds and didn't know if I would ever at point there was one point I thought I don't know if I'll be able to walk fully normally again I spent the first half of my career believing that food was the most powerful medicine in the world I'm here to tell you that mindset is the most powerful medicine in the world [Music] hi I'm Dr Josh ax and welcome to the growth Lab podcast where we discuss the science behind how to grow yourself your wealth your health and take your career and relationships to the next level again I'm Dr Josh ax I'm a graduate of Johns Hopkins University I'm the founder of ancient nutrition and leaders.com and on today's episode we're going to talk about the power of mindset we'll go through how mindset can help you experience a breakthrough in nearly every area of your life and you might have heard of different types of mindsets such as a growth mindset an abundance mindset a positive mindset a strategic mindset and others today we're going to hone in on some specific mindsets that can help you experience a breakthrough and become more resilient and I want to start off sharing a story about my past year now some of you might be new to me some of you may have uh may have listened to my past podcasts and seen some of the videos I've put out there but up until about eight weeks ago I was in a really serious health crisis and so my entire career I've tried to be a role model of health and so I've worked out every single day and eaten very very healthy throughout my entire career and about a year ago I went in for just a routine injection and an injection was a stem cell or PRP injection where you they take your own blood and stem cells re-inject them into an area of injury and so I was doing CrossFit I was I was working out many years ago about nine years ago injured my back a little bit and and had some back issues but over time it had gotten pretty good but I still had this nagging issue in my low back and so I learned the power of regenerative medicine and and I had gotten stem cell a couple times before and every time it helped my back and now I just had a little problem left and so I went in one more time got a stem cell injection however after the injection something just didn't feel right and I started noticing more and more pain in my low back and then over time it got to the point where I could barely get up in the morning and then I couldn't walk finally we had to call an ambulance to come pick me up because the pain was so bad and I hadn't been able to walk for two weeks and at first I thought well maybe I just re-injured my back and they went in and did an MRI and they found out I had a spinal infection the infection had gotten into my bone an abscess had formed and I and I met with a doctor and he said you know this is really serious even with treatment you may be disabled the rest of your life is I want you to think about this for myself so this was just over a year ago and I was at the point where I was swimming a mile every other day I was doing squats and deadlifts and working out and throwing my two-year-old girl a little girl in the air and very physically active and strong and I went to the point where I literally could not walk or move in fact the pain got so bad that I literally couldn't even roll over in bed I lost 40 pounds and didn't know if I would ever at point there was one point I thought I don't know if I'll be able to walk fully normally again and so I started doing a lot of different natural treatments I started doing uh ozone therapy I started doing hyperbaric chamber I did every vitamin and supplement you could think of I ate perfectly I did I vitamin IVs all kinds of things and I did some conventional treatment too and I started doing all of these treatments and even after a month I didn't notice a difference and finally one day I started feeling a little bit different I started feeling a little bit better but this was almost five to six months later after that initial pain and I got to a point after months and months of not being able to figure out what was going on because just to jump back a little bit that MRI didn't come for months later because that was my second MRI I had two MRIs the first MRI they said well it just looks like there's some damage here the infection was not showing up and so I was doing everything unimaginable to heal and I got to the point where say this I'm generally a very positive person I felt the emotions of depression and despair and hopelessness for the first time in my entire life I'd never felt those emotions in that way before because I had tried so many things and nothing seemed to be working the other thing was is I've been uh you know practice I've I've practiced functional medicine for for 15 years before moving over as I am now into the leadership and and uh and and personal growth space um but I I didn't know I didn't know what to do so again I lost 40 pounds I didn't walk for nearly a year and when I went in and met with an infectious disease specialist he said Josh I want to let you know that you may be permanently disabled from this infection that's in your disc and what the specific diagnosis was also osteomyelitis and that's when infection gets into your bone and actually starts eating away at the bone in the disc and those parts of your body and so I was is in this place but you know what I had just maybe a day or two of this feeling of Despair and then I said you know what I've got a strong mindset I'm going to change my mind the way that I think about this and I started visualizing and believing you know what I'm going to be throwing my two-year-old up in the air again I'm going to uh be swimming a mile a day and and and and squatting and dead lifting and doing all the things I want to do and I really sort of visualized myself doing those things in the future and around that same time I slowly started to heal and get a little bit better and better and better uh every single day and by the way so this happened in July this injection and then the first time I was able to walk was around May on that was on a walker and the first time I was able to walk without a walker was really in June and I was able to go back uh actually I was living in Puerto Rico at the time back to Nashville and was able to officiate my sister-in-law's wedding and I slowly got back to working out and now I'm in video in front of you right now and listen this was only about three four months ago where I was in that state and so the thing I want to share about this is is that you know there are a lot of lessons I learned about mindset you know I think when you experience something there's a greater level sometimes of understanding and wisdom than maybe if you just learn about it or read about it in a book and so I want to share with you today is the power of your mindset listen no matter what you're experiencing in your life right now maybe it's a Health crisis maybe you've been diagnosed with something very serious and it's been affecting your whole life maybe it's chronic pain maybe it's cancer maybe it's diabetes there's some sort of issue and it's affecting your life I'm going to share with you the most important thing you have to do to break through and some of the power of mindset with that you know maybe you've got a relationship and it's just you feel trapped and you don't know how that relationship could get better I'm going to share with you some of the mindset principles behind it or maybe a person saying you know what like I need a breakthrough in my career I've been doing the same thing year after year my my pay is hardly grown or if you're an entrepreneur my business is hardly grown and I need to experience a breakthrough listen I'm telling you the key is mindset I spent the first half of my career believing that food was the most powerful medicine in the world I'm here to tell you that mindset is the most powerful medicine in the world and if you think rightly and you start to understand and think things the right way it will impact in a positive manner every area of your life in fact I truly believe that mindset is the most crucial aspect to your health as well for instance there's something called neuroplasticity and that means your brain can change and your body can change based on your thinking so I want to give you an example there are medical studies around this one is done by an incredible Stanford researcher her name's uh Aaliyah crumb by the way this study is called the milkshake study and they gave a group of people a milkshake they told one group this is a this is a 170 calorie really healthy shake and they told another group of people this is a very indulgent filling uh you know filling Shake here's the crazy thing they said this was like 800 calories okay very high calorie Shake by the way both shakes were the same they were both like 350 calories and so the group that was we're told hey this is only 170 calories they were hungry all day they felt like they were being deprived they needed more that to eat more food and the group that ate that what they thought was an 800 calorie Shake they said throughout the whole day I'm full I don't you know I don't know if I need to eat lunch I can eat smaller meals and they felt more satisfied now here's the other crazy part of the study and other studies is that your body will change what it's actually doing physiologically you can actually even through your thinking burn more fat or hold on to more body fat based on your line of thinking and what you think of food is actually doing to your body and so it's crazy what happens when you think about the power of mindset now I want to share some of these lessons and some things you can do to develop a resilient mindset that can help you break through anything that you're battling in your life now one of my first lessons was this when I was in this state of suffering and again remember this I wasn't able to hardly get out of bed when I say the only thing I can do is sometimes crawl and so I didn't get out of bed for nearly a year and when I was in that position you know the biggest thing I thought about it wasn't hey can I build a bigger business it wasn't uh can I make more money the biggest thing that I regretted at the time was not being able to play with my two-year-old that was the biggest thing tugging on my heartstrings at that time and I told my wife Chelsea I said Chelsea if we lost everything we had and I only had you and Arwen that's all I need and when you're in that position in life and you get in difficult situations you realize what matters most and oftentimes this happens at the end of our life but here's the thing I want you to encourage you to think about what matters the most now what should your priorities truly be so often we spend time chasing after different accomplishments and accolades and recognition and I'm telling you the most important thing you'll ever have the most important position is probably as a spouse or a parent or a friend or a leader to somebody and so you want to be thinking about what are my true priorities and here's another thing that's so important in regards to mindset it's how you view suffering if you view when you're going through suffering in life and listen there's a lot of forms of suffering there's a there's physical suffering there's emotional suffering where maybe you've been the victim of some sort of uh verbal abuse it could be past trauma of some sort they're right there's there's many forms of suffering it could be regret you have pain of regret of something that you wished happened and it didn't there are lots of forms of suffering but here's here's one of the most important mindsets you can cultivate that you will be refined through your suffering and it will be used for good think about that that's the thing I will use suffering for good and when I was in that situation not able to get out of bed I thought that to myself I said how can I use this situation of suffering for good not to benefit necessarily myself but to benefit others and that's the mindset you want here's another key when it comes to mindset taking the you're taking the focus off yourself onto others we'll talk about that with one of my five key points here in a minute but prioritization is so important in saying I'm going to be refined through this process of suffering and really focus on and meditate upon hey what's the most important thing in life so that's step number one okay when you think about what are some lessons learned when it comes to mindset it's prioritized what are the most important things you have going on in your life focus on those things and if something is outside of you know the health of your family or your faith or your health or certain things that are the most important then maybe don't make a big deal out of them you know for instance if it rains on your parade it's really not that big of a deal probably as long as your family and your health and other things are are intact and so so it's important to allow yourself to be refined through that suffering process and not view yourself as a victim view yourself as a hero breaking through number two you want to have a Spirit of Hope you want to have a hopeful mindset because here's what happens let me ask this when you think about the way you're thinking you need to ask is this serving me I want to give you an example so when I was in this state of not being able to walk and I didn't know what was going on and I literally had and when I say the pain was so severe I literally couldn't roll over in bed it was that bad and when I had this pain I uh I thought to myself you know what what if I never walk again what if I'm bound to a wheelchair what I and my head started going here and then I thought to myself for a minute I thought you know what that's not going to help me get better based on you know what every religion says and based on what scientific literature shows today scientific literature actually demonstrates that if you believe you're going to have a good outcome you will likely have a good outcome and we're going to head on more on This research in the medical literature here in just a little bit but it's important to know that if you believe you're going to get a bad outcome you're more likely to get a bad outcome if you believe you're going to have a good outcome you're more likely to have a good outcome how and here's what I started to think about I started to think about I need to stop feeling sorry for myself or being in a state of hopelessness and thinking about all the people that uh you know first off I felt like I was a victim a little bit because this injection I got this stem cell PRP injection was not my fault somehow a little bit of bacteria got on the needle and they went into my disc and injected and I had this done a couple times before with no issues really helped my back and I thought this is going to be getting me back to 100 but somehow I didn't know if it was negligence on someone's part or what happened exactly we still don't know but either way I I could have sat there and said you know what I'm a victim and I could have sat there and felt bad for myself and just set in a state of hopelessness but that doesn't serve me that doesn't help me or anyone else so if you're in that state of victim mentality you need to get out of it and you need to Hope in the future you know how many people have been given diagnoses that they're going to die a few months from now or that they'll never walk again and they did it happens all the time it happens every day and so you want to fix your eyes on the outcome that you want and believe that that's the key and that's even what our scientific literature shows us today so if you want to double your business you want to focus on that you want to read as much as you can about other people that have doubled their business similar thing you want to read about a a great marriage maybe you're in the midst of a marriage struggle right now and your spouse doesn't agree with you on something and you haven't been able to fix it fix your eyes and think about who are some people who were at the bottom of their marriage and ended up being you know uh restored to a great marriage read those things and find out how they did it and do do your part in order to do that but hope for the best future that is such a key part of you healing and by the way even neurologically what happens in terms of dopamine and oxytocin release and these are neurochemicals that actually actually can support your healing when you think about something in a positive versus negative manner here's another lesson I learned Foster an attitude of gratitude I woke up in the morning and I was in pain and I was feeling bad and I thought I don't know what's going on but what I did anyways is I said you know what I'm grateful for my family I'm grateful for uh my career I'm I got grateful for so many things and so you want to uh you want to facilitate an attitude of gratitude another thing you want to do and we just have a few more here uh before we jump into the five key points and you want to have grit there's a great book by Stanford psychologist Angela Duckworth and the book is called grit and the book is all about how to develop a mindset of resilience a mindset of perseverance and basically here's here's what you do with Grizz you say you know what I've got a great prize in front of me I've got a purpose and I'm gonna I'm determined I will get through it I will get through it with a positive mindset and that's really what grid is is saying I'm going to be resilient there's a uh there's a another uh Professor from NYU his name is Jonathan hand and he wrote a book called The coddling of the American mind and one of the things that he's shown is that oftentimes even younger Generations gen Z and some early Millennials now this isn't the entire population but compared to older populations they tend to have less resilience they're not as gritty they can't handle the pain they give up more easily and it's important that you recognize if that's you in either way you want to have a resilient mindset of knowing you can get through anything you know when we're when we're talking about mindset also being strategic I learned that you know I need to plan out my days I I had one friend who said this he said he said hey what have you been doing when you've been you know bedridden for for six months now at that point I was veteran for six months he said what have you been doing and I said I shared with him he said you know what if I were you I just would have been eating Cheetos and uh and surfing the internet all day and watching movies and I said you know what that's not me you know I've got a big purpose and so we're going to jump into that now I want to talk to you about five keys to building a resilient mindset those keys are really related to purpose related to uh heroic action your identity this is probably the biggest thing of all your community and becoming great so we'll talk about these five keys in order for you to develop a resilient mindset that can overcome anything the first key is tied to purpose why you exist let me ask you that question if somebody asked you why do you exist how do you answer that question that's a big part of your mindset and so for me mine was really tied into the spiritual of believing that I was made in the image of God and I was a child of God and so that gave me a big purpose and so that was a big part of that of believing that I'm called to love people and really turn Earth into a paradise this is one reason why I love regenerative agriculture in fact I own four thousand acres of certified organic land with a friend of mine Jordan Rubin in Missouri and Tennessee where we do we raise animals and uh fruit trees and all kinds of things which I'll I'll share here as well but going back to this what is your why Simon sinek wrote a great book about this related to business is start with why your why is so incredibly important why do you wake up in the morning why do you do what you do and so you really want to think more about what is your purpose and this really led me to and motivated me I wrote a book while I was in this state this book uh will come out in April of 2024 it's called think this not that and the book is all about uh cultivating a powerful mindset of breakthrough it's a it's a book about the mindset it's 12 different mindsets but specifically overcoming limiting beliefs and we're going to do an episode here very soon about limiting beliefs and how to break through those but what is your purpose and so there is a uh by the way listen to this study this is a research study and they serve they surveyed Americans thousands of Americans and they said um how many of people have a clear sense of purpose listen to this only 25 of people that live in America have a clear sense of purpose so 75 of people don't know what their purpose is and think about that for yourself if you don't have a clear sense of purpose it's one of the things that's the most detrimental to you having a healthy mindset to you being a leader do you having great relationships do you have in great health if you don't have a sense of purpose in fact medical studies show if you don't have a sense of purpose it causes more depression and anxiety in your life as well so there's lots of side effects on your health in your career your spiritual life if you don't know what your purpose is now there is a Japanese exercise um called akigi which stands for purpose and here's how they help you determine your purpose I'm gonna I'm gonna go through these number one is what do you love so there's four questions you answer number one what do you love what is that thing that you just absolutely love in the world number two what is it something the world needs what's that thing that pulls on your heartstrings and you might even say something like that's not right that's an injustice that needs to be fixed so what is that thing something you love something that a need in the world the third question to answer is and maybe the most important is what are you good at what are your talents and your gifts and your unique abilities right maybe you're a great writer maybe you're great with people customer service maybe you're great at practicing medicine maybe you're great at Psychology but what are you great at the fourth thing is what gives you a great reward you get done and this could be tied to finances most the time it is or it could also be tied to a feeling of fulfillment knowing that you've done something that's very meaningful and significant so answer those four questions to find your purpose now I love soccer I grew up playing soccer but is it a need in the world something people truly need maybe not can I get rewarded doing it well if I was really good at it yes but I'm not that I'm not you know I was I was good in high school and in college but I wasn't good beyond that right so all that being said so so you need to think about that and that's where you have to ask all four of those questions and that will help you identify your purpose listen to a few of these quotes about the power of purpose this is by Miles Monroe the greatest tragedy in life is not death but a life without purpose Franklin D Roosevelt said we have always held to the hope the belief the conviction that there is a better life a better world Beyond the Horizon now I want to say this as well what I believe are Global purposes all of us together is to love God love people and make earth a more Heavenly Place think about how incredible you know I'm a big Lord of the Rings fan and you'll find that as we get into this podcast I'll share a few insights of J.R.R Tolkien who had such a brilliant uh philosophical mind but you know when you look at like what would your Paradise look like if you could have any home anywhere Chelsea and I took a trip not that long ago to Italy and when we were there we went to places like Amalfi Coast and Cinque Terra and they had these mountains that were uh on the Mediterranean Sea and I thought to myself how incredible would it be to have a house nested into this mountain where you're overlooking the ocean and then you go out the back of the house and we have a Vineyard and we have all the sort of crops and foods that we could just go and pluck off a tree and we do that with you know my daughter you know our kids and so think about that for yourself most people are gonna have a similar answer right your house is going to be somewhere and just this Lush beautiful nature whether it's on the Ocean or the mountains or a lake or Rolling Hills but it's something like that it's something natural and then your house is probably going to be made of things that are natural as well it's going to be wood and marble and stone and those sorts of things right and and then again we we think about how incredible would it be if you could just walk out the back of your house and grab any food you wanted at almost any time and that's Paradise so think about if we were able to take the deserts that are on this planet and these areas that are just rock and dirt and we could turn those areas where there's poverty and people not being fed we could turn the entire Earth into a paradise it's really possible when you study regenerative agriculture you start to learn and understand that it's possible through science and through agriculture to actually make the planet that if people would act with wisdom and lack of selfishness you we we could literally you can turn deserts into rainforests that's the reality if you can play a part in loving people right creating that sort of paradise within for other people and turning the planet into a paradise you're doing something truly meaningful that's tied to purpose a few other quotes here one by the great and Brilliant mind of Albert Einstein who said only a life lived in service to others is a life worth living so when your life is less about you and more about serving and adding value to others that's meaningful that's significant and what our culture has done today has made it all about us versus hey how do we serve others but you're going to find that mindset of I'm here to serve others I'm here to add value contribute to the betterment of others it lifts their life but it lifts your life even further the more you serve others it's that idea the greatest of all is a servant of all listen to this study on purpose participants goals were placed into three categories self-focused achievement focused and family focused those with more family focused goals had a higher rate of well-being and fulfillment than those who had more self-centric goals so you can see when your goals are more about benefiting others and less about benefiting yourself you have more happiness fulfillment well-being even Health in your life and so you can see there the outcome with that servant driven mindset so this is mindset it's taking it the mindset from yourself to others very important so that's step number one if you want to cultivate a resilient mindset a powerful mindset step number one find your purpose do that at Kiki exercise step number two find your mission right so your purpose is finding that thing you're great at the mission is attaching a goal to it so saying I want to uh give five thousand dollars a year to this charity to to to end human trafficking or to to to to to dig clean wells in Africa or build roads or whatever it might be or something regarding uh healing the planet or people right so you have a mission there and maybe your mission is also tied to something for your family I want my kids to go to a school where they can you know get an education that's very virtuous and not sort of this immoral education that many kids are getting today and wrong thinking right so so you have these these missions tied to your career and your finances and your marriage and your kids and so you really lay out this mission-driven life it's all about the mindset of a hero versus a villain here's what happens most of us at some point in life could end up as a victim and a victim is feeling like you're helpless there's nothing you can do you live in a state if you're in hopelessness a villain says others have hurt me I've you know for instance I got this injection into my back and then because of this in my suffering I want to make everyone else miserable and I want to complain and everyone to know how bad I have it and make others feel bad I sort of what what others you know what is that there's a quote something like misery loves company right so that's what a villain does it's all about pride and resentment or Envy well I'm suffering so that's not fair that other people are out there enjoying their life or having a good time that's what a villain thinks here's what a hero does a hero takes personal responsibility so for myself when I was going through this crisis I thought to myself you know what I can I'm going to do everything that I can right now I'm going to eat healthy I'm going to do any sort of physical therapy that I can I'm going to uh I'm going to encourage and add value to others and help them fulfill their dreams and goals in life right that's the idea there is this heroic mindset of saying here's the difference a villain says I'm going to use my pain and suffering for evil a hero says I'm going to use this pain and suffering for good you know my mom was diagnosed with cancer many years ago and she survived it by learning some of these principles of around mindset medicine that we're talking about and around food is medicine and my mom didn't use her suffering to complain or anything else and in fact she teaches other uh women now how to make who suffer with breast cancer how to make superfood smoothies and anti-cancer meals and things so she's using that for good and so you want to do the same thing and so another key mindset is having a mission-driven mindset take time and think to yourself what are my important missions in life over the next one year five year ten years what are some missions you have and then go and fulfill those in a heroic Way by contributing the lives of others number three identity is a key is a key part of mindset listen to this quote by psychologist Carl Zhang the world will ask who you are and if you don't know the world will tell you that's the reality this is happening in culture today we're living in this victim culture where everyone feels like they're a victim they're not really a victim the world's just telling them they're a victim there's an ancient Persian proverb that says this I cried because I had no shoes until I saw a man who had no feet you know when I was dealing with the chronic pain I was having I was on Facebook at one point I was kind of I was looking at some things in my feed and I saw this man who had lost one of his he had lost his foot in a uh in a a jet skiing accident and I thought to myself you know what he's got he's having a harder time than I am right now I think he just he he he he lost a limb and he actually had many other injuries there as well and I thought you know what uh I'm gonna I'm I'm gonna you know I'm thinking about him right now how I can add value to him and his recovery all that being said right it's all your perspective is so important so as we talk about identity there tends to be three identities modern traditional and divine by the way here's what an identity is your identity is tied to your roles and your responsibilities for example my role one of my roles right now is as a dad okay so that's a role I have so my identity I'm a dad and then my responsibilities as a dad are to train up my daughter in the way she should go in terms of being virtuous in her character in terms of being kind and generous into having a good work ethic so these are all my responsibilities of a father of to nurture her and tell her how much I love her but also to challenge her to be the best she can be right so so I'm aware that's a role I have as a dad and then I have responsibilities that come with it and the more meaningful your roles are and the more you take on and embrace those responsibilities the more significant and meaningful your life is this is really really important to understand so modern identity what it's all about it's all it's all about um labeling yourself as something uh as a victim so it could be your race it could be your gender it could be your sexuality it could be your uh nationality could be your upbring could be your disability right like I used to when I ran my functional medicine clinic I would have patients come in I remember one time I had a patient come in I'm thinking of two actually in my head now one with fibromyalgia and another that came in with Lyme disease and I do want to always be sensitive and compassionate because I do understand that it's hard when you're suffering it's hard to take the focus off yourself but they had their identity in fact if you would ask them their identity like who are you one of the first things that would come out that come out of their mouth in a in a conversation would be I'm I have fibromyalgia or I'm a Lyme disease patient like it was their identity was very and by the way have you ever met anyone like that their their identity is tied to they have a victim is what we call a victim mentality they like live with a victim identity and we see this in the world today where where everybody is having this victim mentality but that's the modern identity today because it's all about them now a traditional identity by the way I'm going to do a very big breakdown on a future podcast episode all about identity if you're not subscribed make sure to subscribe to the podcast because we're going to really dive into the science and psychology behind all these things but the traditional identity is more about national pride and patriotism it's about your tribe and your community so think about ancient tribes and groups of people they weren't just fending for themselves they were fending for the community and you tended to have within the community maybe a baker and a blacksmith and a farmer and a seamstress and a you know and a hunt you you had this group of people and essentially the whole tribe took care of each other that's a traditional identity and it's more virtuous and it's better than a modern identity but the traditional identity sometimes it's about your tribe but also it sometimes becomes very negative about other tribes and they can attack other tribes and only think about their tribe in their community at the expense of others and so that can happen in a traditional identity think about modern identity is marry whoever you want it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't matter what your parents want what anyone else thinks it's what you want in your feelings right now that's a modern identity traditional identity is all about what's best for the community think about an arranged marriage right okay so that's there's an example real life examples now let's go to this next identity mindset and it's not about this this identity is not just about you it's not just about your community it's about the world and it's called a Divine identity and this is where your Divine identity by the way you always attach your identity to something it's it's your community or your feelings or or or some form of the Divine and listen this this could be pervasive to many different religions uh Christians Jews Muslims Buddhists taoists you know this is true if your identity is attached to something that's Divine and eternal you it builds a stronger identity because think about this for myself if if I'm in the state of suffering and physical disability if I lived in that state I would think about this is the only life I have it's kind of over for me you know like or and by the way I don't think that for myself now even if I did but generally saying that if I really believed that hey this time on Earth is all there is versus if I believe and there's a great quote by C.S Lewis and he says something like this he says the people that make the biggest impact in this life are the people that think most about the next life right so if you believe that after you die maybe there's a heaven or hell or an eternity then then you operate differently you're storing up Treasures for yourself maybe on Heaven rather than on earth right so it's important to understand this is an important mindset do you have a temporal just here and now only or an eternal mindset and so if you have more of an eternal mindset the way you act in fact think about Mother Teresa if Mother Teresa didn't believe there was an eternity would she have done would she have lived the life she lived exactly like she did she was very very aware of Eternity and so she served others in lieu of that so this is called a Divine identity your identity is tied to something Divine now listen we know in Christian thought we see Martin Luther King and Mother Teresa and many others have this sort of mindset we see this though as well even with Gandhi um uh you know in in his religion or Confucius or Buddha so when you have a more of a Divine identity it's tied to something Eternal the way you think and you act your mindset becomes very different and I want to encourage you develop a Divine identity it makes your life more meaningful and so a Divine identity is really about uh being connected and serving everyone not just yourself or not just your community it's sort of the betterment of all and I really believe the most powerful identity is where you get a god-given identity it's not something you necessarily only have to earn or just earn it's something that is given to you with Grace and so we're going to do a deeper dive on identity here in the future one of the last couple things here is the identity surrounding going solo or running with it running with a community and we really saw this during the covet pandemic I'm going to read a couple and go through a couple research studies here that I think are very enlightening listen this loneliness is on the rise having doubled since the 1980s so again loneliness and feeling of isolation has doubled social media has made it worse than ever before research tells us the higher the social media use the more pervasive the loneliness is just how prevalent is loneliness studies show that nearly half of Americans report feeling alone or isolated listen 50 percent of people in America feel lonely or isolated and 40 percent say their relationships aren't meaningful that's a huge percentage of people and most of us even if you say I have some meaningful relationships it's not what I want most of us want more we know it could be so much better and most of us have this mindset of I've got to do it all it's all you know it's it's it's I'm gonna go at it alone former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy relayed a shocking Discovery in an article wrote this was written in Harvard Harvard Business Review he reported that having weak social connections is as harmful to our health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day by the way being lonely or you not having a strong Community around you is worse for you than being obese for your health that's not even to mention your mental health in other areas of your life and so it's important to know that you really want to build a strong sense of community in your life you want to have a community mindset you want to ask the question not how but who who else who can help you with something who can you sir you know who can you who can you start a business with so oftentimes we just think about me me me think about we we as much as you possibly can there's a 2013 study published in in psychological sciences and they found that people who are low in self-control if they just spend time around people that are more self-disciplined it was incredibly statistically significant in them achieving their goals so think about this if you're a person and you're not disciplined the most important thing you can do according to studies is spend time around disciplined people there's a law called dunbar's law and basically the law states that you become like the people you surround yourself with now people uh We've we've heard this probably you know The Five People You spend the most time with is who you become it's true but not entirely true the five people have the greatest impact on you but if you have another 50 people that you spend some time with those people also do impact you fairly in a fairly significant way as well and so it's important to understand but really you do want to focus on who are those five people and you may want to upgrade your inner circle I'm not saying get rid of all your friends I am saying though you want to focus on who are the people in your life that have a strong mindset and spend more time with those people so the mindset of others will influence your mindset in a positive or negative way last Point here when it comes to mindset is you want to have a mindset of not just accomplishing things but of who you can become you've probably used at some point in your life and to-do list you know you check off the tasks you have on your daily schedule rather than a to-do list start a to be list who do you want to become think about yourself the most powerful you in the future that person who think about the person you respect most in the world in their character and in maybe their accomplishments but especially their character like this person just has incredible character what are the things that define them who do you want to be known as for instance myself like I want to be wise I want to be compassionate I want to be generous I want to be uh I want to be thought of as somebody who uh embodies servant leadership right and so I think about that so rather than a to-do list of I've gotta do this today or hit this goal I think about myself saying I want to be a servant leader and so I'm focused on becoming my mindset is that as of a servant leader I'm studying the people in history whether it be Jesus or Gandhi or Mother Teresa or MLK or others who who embodies servant leadership studying and reading about their life and trying to model what they've done so this is the other mindset you want a mindset of to be what do you want to be so take time and think about what are five things you want to be regarding your character and it can be skill as well maybe you want to be a gourmet Baker my wife Chelsea actually just before this I came up my wife is experimenting and getting really good with making sourdough uh whole grain bread and things like that so she's she's doing a lot of fermentation and so you know I want my wife to be a great baker it's awesome uh in some of the incredible Foods she makes but also in addition you know so think about myself I want to become uh maybe you could say yourself a uh a leadership expert or or a great mom or great dad right those are other things right so think about what is your to be list that's another thing in terms of mindset your mindset is not about your accomplishments your mindset is on becoming the greatest version of yourself you know so so to wrap up the podcast here I want to go through a few last things and that is one cultivate a more powerful mindset understand that mindset is your greatest form of medicine and I want you to think to yourself where am I missing out in my mindset could could my mindset get stronger in certain areas where could I improve you know especially in regards we talked about purpose and uh Mission and Community as well so really think about those areas and in future podcasts we're going to talk about a growth mindset we're going to dive into that we're going to talk about a strategic mindset we're going to talk about how to overcome limiting beliefs we'll go through goal setting uh we're going to go through a lot of really incredible topics I'm excited to share with you also hey don't forget to subscribe here I've got a lot more we we have a lot more podcasts coming out on a regular basis where I'm also going to get into a lot of relevant news what's going on today and how should you think about it in terms of the right mindset and Leadership around some of these topics well thanks for tuning in to the growth Lab podcast again remember each week we're going to uncover the science behind how to grow yourself your health your wealth and take your career and relationships to the next level again thank you for subscribing thanks everybody who is sharing this liking it and uh and I appreciate everybody taking part and feel free to leave comments I'd love to hear from you what are some upcoming topics you'd love to hear from me talk about whether it be personal growth professional growth wealth building Health anything let me know some topics you'd like me to come however thanks for tuning in I'll see you next week

Channel: Dr. Josh Axe

Views: 74,695

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Id: 9SGBHAQ3Tt0

Length: 44min 41sec (2681 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 03 2023